


The Oceanview Motel

by pocketcucco



Category: Alan Wake (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, featuring the oceanview motel from control, i miss barry, just had an idea and ran with it lmao, light control expansion 2: awe spoilers in end notes, not super canon compliant idk, remedyverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:35:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26298757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pocketcucco/pseuds/pocketcucco
Summary: Alan wakes up in an unfamiliar place. Fortunately, someone he knows is there waiting for him.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 10





	The Oceanview Motel

Alan Wake was falling.

 _Can't write yourself out of this one, can you, Wake?_ he asked himself – as though he could pull his typewriter out of midair and produce a tower of fluffy pillows on the ground below him.

He... wasn't even quite sure how he'd gotten here. Did he write this scenario? Was he living it? Was this like the time he'd wound up in Night Springs? Was-

Alan suddenly hit the ground, hard – but not hard enough to kill him. He lay there for a moment, coughing and sputtering until his breath slowly worked its way back into his lungs.

He clenched his hands; good, not broken. They curled around –

A blanket?

Alan sat up. The ground – no, a...mattress? – shifted beneath him.

He was in a room, and for once, it didn't look like the room the Dark Place always saw fit to trap him in when he was writing.

Florescent light filtered in through the broken blinds on the window and illuminated what looked like a dingy, middle of nowhere motel room. The carpet was threadbare, and the single watercolor on the paneled walls looked like it had been hanging there since the 70s, at least. The desk across from the bed was chipped and made from cheap particle board.

But there was a lamp on that desk. Alan scrambled to switch it on before the Darkness could creep in.

Artificial light flooded the room. Alan breathed his first real sigh of relief in what felt like years and sat back down.

He had to take stock of the situation: was he in another reality? Was this yet another obstacle the Darkness had put before him? If so, what did it want from him _this_ time?

For a few minutes he just sat there, silent, taking in the sounds of far-off cars and the hum of the streetlamp outside his window.

It felt strange hearing all that ambient noise again after so long with the Darkness and its muffled silence.

A knock at the door startled him so badly, he nearly jumped off the bed.

“Al!” The knocks grew more insistent when he didn't move. “Open up! C'mon!”

“... _Barry_?”

He could hardly believe it. It had to be some trick of the Dark Place's, something to lure him into a false sense of security.

But Alan was so desperate to see another human, to interact with someone besides himself, that he nearly fell over in his attempt to throw the chain lock and open the door.

And it _was_ Barry, big red parka and all – even his stupid Christmas lights and the headlamp he'd been wearing when they ran through Bright Falls. He stood in in the musty hallway with his arms crossed over his chest.

This was all part of the dream. _Had_ to be. Barry was in the waking world, the _real_ one, not stuck in this nightmare with him. At least he hoped not. Barry deserved better than that, especially after all he'd done to help him in Bright Falls.

“Who else? C'mon, you gonna let me in?” Barry pushed past him without waiting for an answer – what was new? “Hey, when's the last time you changed out of that coat?”

“I don't really need to around here,” Alan said, still befuddled. “It's all kind of... Wait, where are we?”

Barry gave him a look as he gestured around. “Oceanview Motel? Hello? We've been stuck here for weeks.”

 _Oceanview Motel._ Was it in Bright Falls? He couldn't remember. It sounded like the name of a place in some Stephen King novel he'd read in college.

“I don't... The name doesn't ring a bell.”

“I'm tellin' ya, Al, I think you've been dipping into that moonshine again. You're a little funnier in the head than usual.” He made a spinning motion with his finger. “Do you even remember where we're going?”

“No, sorry.”

“Back to the lake, Al! Seriously! You were going on about it all afternoon! You wanted me to wake you up after sunset so we could head out.”

Alan nodded vaguely, glad to have a purpose again – and stopped. Something about this felt familiar. He'd seen Barry in the Dark Place before, hadn't he? An apparition of him, at least. A figment.

But this one felt so _real_. He'd felt Barry's shoulder when he pushed his way into the room.

Maybe he'd finally written himself out?

No. That couldn't be possible.

Could it?

“Hello? Earth to Al?”

He blinked, and Barry was several feet away, staring at him with his hands outstretched.

“Yeah. Coming.”

“Something's off about you, you know. Don't have your usual zip.”

“I'm just...” Alan sighed. Felt the _weight_ of that sigh in his bones. “Just a little tired, I guess.”

Barry nodded. “Yeah, I get that. You've been dealing with a lot lately, you know?”

“Boy, do I ever.”

“How long has it been, anyway?”

“What do you mean?”

“Since you got stuck in here.”

Alan hesitated. Barry just stood there in front of him, eyebrows raised. Waiting.

Okay. So maybe this _was_ something he'd written. But why? How would this get him out of the Dark Place?

“Al?”

“It's been... God, Barry, I don't know, time doesn't work the same way here as it does in the real world.”

His friend's voice was strangely gentle when he spoke again. “We miss you, Al. But we believe in you, whatever you're doing here. You'll make it all right.”

“I don't know anymore. It's been...so _long_. Or I think it has.”

“Hey, where's this self doubt coming from? This is the man who wrote _Sudden Stop_ even when he thought he couldn't, huh?”

Alan forced a short, bark of a laugh. “Yeah, sure. I did that one for the money.”

“And you're doing this for...?”

“Alice is safe now, right? So, I guess... myself.”

Barry nodded encouragingly.

“I miss everyone. I want to go home. I have to write my way out.”

“Aaaaand _there_ it is!” Barry pumped a fist in the air. “You think too little of yourself these last few years, Al. You've gotta believe in yourself as much as Alice and me do. Hell, think back to when you were in your prime! Write like that again.”

“I don't know if I still have that in me, Barry.”

“Of course you do! You saved Alice, right? And Bright Falls? Now you've just got to save yourself. Easy, right?”

Easier said than done, Alan thought with a shake of his head. But Barry was still nodding at him, and those stupid little Christmas lights were bouncing and bobbing against the stupid wood paneled walls.

“I'll try,” Alan found himself saying. “I have a...a vague sort of idea. I don't know if it'll work. If the Dark Place will let me use it.”

“Yeah? Let's hear it.”

“What if I-”

There was a sound like a gunshot just above his head. Barry didn't seem to notice it, didn't seem to react-

Alan started so violently that he crashed into whatever was in front of him. He smashed his hand into the – keys? – and nearly sent it flying.

He opened his eyes.

The typewriter. Of course.

Back in the Dark Place room.

He shook out his hand, though it didn't really hurt. You didn't feel much in the Dark Place – didn't see much either, given how...well... _dark_ it always was.

Alan looked at the page in front of him.

_“I'll try,” Alan found himself saying. “I have a...a vague sort of idea. I don't know if it'll work. If the Dark Place will let me use it.”_

_“Yeah? Let's hear it.”_

Alan ripped it out and destroyed the words with a few violent strokes of his pen. Don't drag Barry back into this, he told himself. Even if the Dark Place Barry wasn't really _Barry._ This was his cross alone to bear.

But why _Barry_? Why hadn't he written Alice in to give him this little pep talk?

 _Because Barry saw all the horrors. Barry was there through some of the worst of it. Barry just_ knew.

God, he hoped Barry and Alice were okay. He wasn't vain enough to think that they couldn't make due without him, but...

Well, what was the use thinking about it? He was wasting time again.

Alan sighed and went back to work.

**Author's Note:**

> YEAH this isn't super canon compliant I think... It's mostly self indulgent haha. After playing the AWE expansion for Control I was like, man I miss Barry. Alan needs a pep talk from Barry in the motel since Alan seems to be spending some time there anyway. Maybe he can subconsciously write it himself?? Let's do it!


End file.
